Analysis Topic: Politics & Social Trends
The analysis published under this topic are as follows.
Friday, May 30, 2014
Giving the Supreme Sacrifice - Reflecting on a Life / Politics / Social Issues
By: Money_Morning
Dr. Kent Moors writes: We will talk about energy matters another time. Today, I have something else I need to share with you.
This week, we honored those who have given the supreme sacrifice to allow the rest of us to live the kind of lives we do.
For me individually, this is a very tough time of the year. And it is all coming back to me this morning.
Read full article... Read full article...
Thursday, May 29, 2014
The Colder War and the End of the Petrodollar / Politics / Crude Oil
By: Marin_Katusa
The mainstream media are falling over themselves talking about Russia’s just-signed “Holy Grail” gas deal with China, which is expected to be worth more than $400 billion. But here’s what I think the real news is… and nobody’s talking about it—until now, that is.
China’s President Xi Jinping has publicly stated that it’s time for a new model of security, not just for China, but for all of Asia. This new model of security, otherwise known as “the new UN,” will include Russia and Iran, but not the United States or the EU-28.
Read full article... Read full article...
Thursday, May 29, 2014
Doomburgers On The Menu In The UK / Politics / UK Politics
By: Andrew_McKillop
French Like Hamburgers
One way to talk around the problem of food no longer having any taste – called the Malbouffe crisis in France and dating to the late 1990s – is to dumb down and eat what everybody else eats. So French today eat hamburgers. Adding a regulation dose of French hypocrisy, this comes down to selling hamburgers – at well over 20 euros ($27) each - by calling them Gastro(nomic) Burgers made from Organic Foods and “elaborated” by French cooking experts called Les Toques.
Thursday, May 29, 2014
The End of Federal Taxation as We Know It / Politics / Taxes
By: Barry_Elias
The way we tax is obsolete.
It’s safe to say, in the century since the federal income tax was instated, the system has become broken. The complex, voluminous tax code (included in the 70,000+ page CCH Standard Federal Tax Reporter) needs a revolutionary overhaul.
The current system doesn’t raise nearly enough money, Social Security is nearing insolvency, the administrative cost is exorbitant, and economic growth is actually impeded.
Read full article... Read full article...
Wednesday, May 28, 2014
Angela Merkel Snubs Global Warming And Dumps The Solar Industry / Politics / Solar Energy
By: Andrew_McKillop
Mutter and Stutter
Germany's Angela Merkel, nicknamed the Mutter for “Mother” of a successful Germany who got herself re-elected, is said by Berlin daily 'TAZ' to have already decided she will not attend the Ban Ki-Moon-initiated UN climate conference in New York this September. The paper says this was “confirmed by a government spokesman“. If so, Merkel’s decision to snub the event is likely another sign that efforts to implement present climate agreements, and forge new ones are already dead in the water. Germany EEG or renewable energy law (Erneuerbare-Energien-Gesetz) is another very likely collateral victim.
Wednesday, May 28, 2014
Capital Controls Rolling Into High Gear Under FATCA / Politics / Global Financial System
By: Jeff_Berwick
The traditional banking system was already bad enough but now, with banks around the world rushing to comply with the Foreign Account Tax Compliance Act (FATCA) it is beginning to reach extreme levels. And it isn't just affecting the most financially restricted people on Earth: US citizens... it is affecting everyone.
Take myself for example. I operate numerous businesses worldwide. I am a Canadian citizen as well as the citizen of a Caribbean country and our business operations are also operated out of a non-tax jurisdiction in the Caribbean. On top of that we hold no bank accounts, whatsoever, in the US... instead, we have bank accounts all over the world.
Read full article... Read full article...
Wednesday, May 28, 2014
France's “Presidential Majority” Ump Party Now Shipwrecked / Politics / France
By: Andrew_McKillop
Get Out and Don't Come Back
The Policy Bureau of France's “Union pour une Majorite Presidentielle” (also called “Union for a Popular Movement”) shook with rage at 11 am on Monday 26 May following the European elections of 25 May. The UMP party founded by Jacques Chirac following the massive shock vote for candidate Jean-Marie Le Pen and his “unconstitutional” Front National party in the 2002 presidential elections was “in torment”. As reported by the finance broadsheet 'Les Echos', 27 May, party president of the UMP, Jean-Francois Cope, was unanimously told to resign and get out immediately - “or nobody in this building will ever shake your hand again”.
Wednesday, May 28, 2014
Power in U.S. Military Black Budgets / Politics / US Military
By: BATR
The top five military contractors by sales are Lockheed Martin, Boeing, Northrop Grumann, General Dynamics and Raytheon. In addition to the Department of Defense allocations, the top five intelligence agencies that often provide military use applications are the Central Intelligence Agency, the National Security Agency, the National Reconnaissance Office, the National Geospatial-Intelligence Program and the General Defense Intelligence Program. The actual amount of monies that go into funding off the books secret projects, estimated by Bill Sweetman as cited in the Economic Crisis and the Pentagon`s Black Budget, exceeds rational comprehension. "The Pentagon’s ‘black’ operations, including the intelligence budgets nested inside it, are roughly equal in magnitude to the entire defense budgets of the UK, France or Japan, and ten percent of the total."
Wednesday, May 28, 2014
Democracy - Another God that Failed / Politics / Social Issues
By: LewRockwell
Patrick J. Buchanan writes: On Memorial Day weekend, scores of thousands of bikers arrived here for their annual Rolling Thunder tribute to America’s veterans, especially those lost in our wars or left behind.
But this year the tribute has been sullied by a squalid scandal in the Department of Veterans Affairs.
Wednesday, May 28, 2014
The Trouble with Climate Change / Politics / Climate Change
By: Andrew_McKillop
“There is something odd about the global warming debate – or the climate change debate.....since global warming has for the time being come to a halt”. In a paper with the title “The Trouble with Climate Change” published by the Global Warming Policy Foundation of Benny Peiser, May 2014, the former UK Chancellor Lawson said that the Prince of Wales reports the 'Orthodoxists' of global warming are now in a stew and say “we are headless chickens”. Pan-fried or otherwise!
Tuesday, May 27, 2014
Are You Sure You Want To Go To War? / Politics / Social Issues
By: Raul_I_Meijer
Ukraine has a new president, or at least someone, Petro Poroshenko, who claims to be. One of the first things to come out of his mouth was that he doesn’t recognize Crimea as being a part of Russia. Still, the good listener knows there were no Ukraine presidential elections in Crimea either on Sunday. So Crimea is supposedly still a part of Ukraine, despite a referendum in which 89% of Crimeans chose not to be, and they get no vote in who gets to be their president either? What does all that mean?
Tuesday, May 27, 2014
Europe Borderlands: First Moves in Romania / Politics / Eastern Europe
By: STRATFOR
I arrived in Bucharest, Romania, the day after U.S. Vice President Joe Biden. U.S. Secretary of Defense Chuck Hagel will be here in a few weeks. The talk in Bucharest, not only among the leadership but also among the public, is about Ukraine. Concerns are palpable, and they are not only about the Russians. They are also about NATO, the European Union, the United States and whether they will all support Romania if it resists Russia. The other side of the equation, of course, is whether Romania will do the things it must do in order to make outside support effective. Biden left Romania with a sense that the United States is in the game. But this is not a region that trusts easily. The first step was easy. The rest become harder.
Tuesday, May 27, 2014
China's Oil Giant At Center Of Corruption Probe / Politics / Oil Companies
By: OilPrice_Com
Grins were on the faces of China National Petroleum executives this week as they celebrated a blockbuster 30-year deal for Russian gas. It was a good day for CNPC, the state-owned colossus at the center of China's oil and gas webs and one of Eurasia's biggest energy investors. For some, however, those grins could soon turn to grimaces, because the deal comes against a backdrop of a series of high profile corruption investigations by the state, and CNPC has been caught in the dragnet. A former CNPC chairman is currently under investigation and a top executive of CNPC subsidiary PetroChina has just been arrested.
Read full article... Read full article...
Monday, May 26, 2014
Memorial Day - Why War Is Inevitable / Politics / US Politics
By: Paul_Craig_Roberts
Memorial Day is when we commemorate our war dead. Like the Fourth of July, Memorial Day is being turned into a celebration of war.
Those who lose family members and dear friends to war don’t want the deaths to have been in vain. Consequently, wars become glorious deeds performed by noble soldiers fighting for truth, justice, and the American way. Patriotic speeches tell us how much we owe to those who gave their lives so that America could remain free.
Read full article... Read full article...
Monday, May 26, 2014
Doomburgers For France / Politics / France
By: Andrew_McKillop
Le Pen
French glove puppet media was roaring by the evening of May 25. It supplied a barrage of “politically correct explanations” for the tsunami of votes for what the glove puppets (until recently) called the unconstitutional, fascist, anti-semite, anti-Arab, anti-Black, anti-European and certainly not Me Too-Two-Party, consumer friendly, socially acceptable political party - the Front National. The FN was anti-ecological, the media also told us. Isn't that a surprise?
Monday, May 26, 2014
The Absurd Bizarro That is Europe / Politics / European Union
By: Raul_I_Meijer
The headlines speak of an earthquake. But just about absolutely everyone who’s been shaken manages to declare victory, including incumbents who have lost, which is the majority of them, in some cases painfully. And European stocks are rising too, in some cases to all time highs. It all adds up to a perfect illustration of the absurd bizarro Europe has become.
Monday, May 26, 2014
Ron Paul - A Scandal is Just the Tip of the Military Abuse Iceberg / Politics / US Military
By: Dr_Ron_Paul
President Obama held a press conference last week to express his outrage over reports that the Veterans Administration was routinely delaying treatment to veterans, with some veterans even dying while on alleged secret waiting lists. The president said that, "if these allegations prove to be true, it is dishonorable, it is disgraceful, and I will not tolerate it, period." He vowed that, together with Congress, he would "make sure we're doing right by our veterans across the board."
Read full article... Read full article...
Sunday, May 25, 2014
1 Million Killed, Iraq the Biggest Petroleum Heist in History? / Politics / Iraq War
By: Mike_Whitney
“Prior to the 2003 invasion and occupation of Iraq, US and other western oil companies were all but completely shut out of Iraq’s oil market. But thanks to the invasion and occupation, the companies are now back inside Iraq and producing oil there for the first time since being forced out of the country in 1973.” – Antonia Juhasz, oil industry analyst, Al Jazeera.
These are the ‘best of times’ for the oil giants in Iraq. Production is up, profits are soaring, and big oil is rolling in dough. Here’s the story from the Wall Street Journal:
Read full article... Read full article...“Iraq’s oil production surged to its highest level in over 30 years last month, surprising skeptics of the country’s efforts to restore its oil industry after decades of war and neglect.” (Wall Street Journal)
Sunday, May 25, 2014
Putin is Grinning - The Deal of the Century / Politics / Russia
By: LewRockwell
Eric Margolis writes: GENEVA – Russia’s leader Vladimir Putin usually wears a perfect poker face. But last week in Shangahi, the icy-cold Russian president came awfully close to bursting into a big grin.
And why not? Putin had just stolen a march on his western rivals. The US-British attempt to wound Russia’s economy and punish Putin for disobedience had just blown up in their red faces.
Saturday, May 24, 2014
An Infamous Advisor for Obama and Putin / Politics / US Politics
By: Stephen_Merrill
Unusual Villain
Some people develop an undeserved bad reputation. It is typically the work of past enemies or the consequence of harsh fortune.
It is quite the unusual person though who develops a bad moral reputation only long after his life has ended, never considered so during his life. In the case of today’s main protagonist his reputation for calculating power-lust and purposeful deceit was earned by the reading of his texts centuries later; not due to any evil deeds of his own. The truly wicked seldom leave confessions of their hidden crimes and thoughts.